Sharing data is important, but Twitter can be used for much more than that, says Eileen Parkes.
Is conference Twitter a good thing?
Reply
Tag Archives: data sharing
Five things you can do today to make tomorrow’s research open
Early career researchers have an essential role to play in the move towards open research, says #SciData17 writing competition winner Sarah Lemprière.
The coming of age of biology
Defending science by opening up: Lessons from Understanding Animal Research
In an effort to tackle the knowledge gap between scientists and the public, and to defend animal research, Understanding Animal Research’s communication strategy of proactive transparency serves as a model to scientists, says Lev Tankelevitch.
In the UK, almost half of the public believes that some animal research goes on without an official licence. The situation is similar in the US. This ignorance finds its way to policy makers around the world who dismiss academics and deride science. Clearly, there is a profound imbalance in the knowledge available to scientists and to the rest of society about animal research.
Illustration by Lev Tankelevitch
#Scidata15: Make the most of your research: Publish better data
Primary research papers are the currency of academics, but they’re also part of a much wider body of knowledge that is restricted by a lack of transparency.
Guest contributor Lakshini Mendis
{credit}Image credit: SCIENTIFIC DATA/LUDIC GROUP{/credit}
Historically, a great deal of trust has been placed in statements made in research papers for which the underlying data have not been shared. The invention of the laser was described in a paper containing just three data-points, for instance, and Watson and Crick first described the structure of DNA in a paper without any data at all. But with about 1,500 papers retracted since 2012, and 26.6% due to misconduct, scientific papers are now firmly under the microscope.
Improving the availability and readability of original research data would go a long way to improving matters. And as scientific publishers largely determine how research data is disseminated, their involvement will be central to any change. Speaking at Publishing Better Science Through Better Data in late October 2015, Dr Joerg Heber and Dr Andrew Hufton, editors at Nature Communications and Scientific Data respectively, emphasised that to make the most of research data it must be more open.
Overcoming the data-sharing challenge
According to Hufton, the status quo is for researchers to only share data with others directly. As well as being inefficient, data associated with published work disappears at a rate of about 17% a year as a result of researchers failing to properly catalogue findings. There is now, therefore, a move from scientific publishers to make data findable, accessible, interoperable and re-useable – or, to use an acronym as those of a scientific persuasion are so often inclined to do, FAIR. Continue reading
#SciData15: Research Data for Discovery: Prepare to Share
Speakers at #SciData15 advocated for a wider degree of awareness of the field of data science and the implementation of data sharing technologies.
Guest contributor Caroline Weight
{credit}Image credit: SCIENTIFIC DATA/LUDIC GROUP{/credit}
“We must engage in the idea of sharing,” said conference chair Iain Hrynaszkiewicz as the 2015 Publishing Better Science through Better Data meeting kicked off at the headquarters of Nature Publishing Group (NPG) in London on 23rd October.
Hrynaszkiewicz, who develops new areas of open research publishing and data policy within NPG/Macmillan, noted that 30 funding bodies — including the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and The Royal Society — have written policies that outline requirements for data-sharing. Examples include detailed methods and protocols, microscopy images and mathematical workings, as well as meta-datasets of, for example, genotypes and microarrays.
The meeting’s aims were to increase awareness of ways to effectively share data and to discuss how to improve the efficiency, implementation and overall impact of sharing among the scientific community. A recurring issue throughout the day was how to enforce sharing, and get the concept to become part of standard, everyday scientific practice –one that seeps into the lives and habits of working researchers. Continue reading
Sharing data: Why it should be done
As data continues to be produced at staggering rates, scientists need to become more aware of the benefits of data sharing, says Eleni Liapi.
Guest contributor Eleni Liapi
{credit}PhotoDisc/Getty Images{/credit}
The scientific community is currently experiencing an explosion in data generation. At CERN (the European Council for Nuclear Research), the rate of data production is 1 petabyte (=1015 bytes) per day inside the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), which is comparable to 210,000 DVDs. At the European Bioinformatics Institute, 20 petabytes of biological data had been stored between 2004- 2012. In the US alone, the volume of data produced by the healthcare industry in 2011 was estimated at 150 exabytes (=1018 bytes). Undoubtedly, this volume of information brings with it several problems, including data storage and sharing.
Access to data is a topic that initiates numerous discussions and opinions between scientists and other communities for a plethora of reasons, including concerns about inappropriate use, institutional or industrial restrictive policies where the gigabytes of obtained genomic data are to be utilised for pharmaceutical research, for example. To date, there have already been attempts to estimate the extent of the problem. In one survey, 67% of the participants expressed the view that inaccessible data hinder scientific progress. Continue reading
Data sharing: Why it’s all ‘mine’
Data sharing makes scientific sense, but the career-conscious nature of scientists may stand in the way.
Guest contributor Rachel Yoho
As with many aspects of society, human nature shapes interactions in science research. When we consider “data sharing,” the likely response is probably a shrug. We’ve all been there. Group work and competition at its finest. The increasingly competitive environment for grant funding, and the ‘publish or perish’ attitude promotes the “mine, mine, mine” attitude among scientists. To focus on the issue of overcoming career-protecting objections to data sharing however, we can focus on several trends.
Data ownership
With many factors, including budget cuts, sequestration and economic downturns, the current scarcity of grant funding creates financial stress in labs. ”Big grants” like the NIH R01, had lower success rates for new grants in 2014 as compared to the last four of five years. In turn, data ownership becomes possessive to the PI and lab, even beyond that of the funding agency or institution. Simply, it’s our grant money, it’s our data. By working for and finally achieving a grant, often after many attempts, a sense of accomplishment and pride in ownership develops. Continue reading
Data sharing: Why it doesn’t happen
The advent of big data has caused scientists to rethink data sharing, but several problems are preventing it from happening, says Nina Divorty.
Guest contributor Nina Divorty
“If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” – Isaac Newton.
This classic quote sums up the nature of scientific collaboration: only by building on the work of our predecessors can we make scientific advancements, and only by sharing our own discoveries can they be built upon by others. Most researchers understand this, but only since the recent surge in technologies that generate very large datasets have we begun to recognise the value of sharing raw data, in addition to publishing results in their processed and polished form. The advantages are clear: raw data offers complete transparency so that other scientists can compare their own results and analyses when attempting to replicate findings, and also allows others to ask novel questions of existing datasets. Despite this, the majority of researchers across a variety scientific disciplines report that lack of access to data detracts from the progress of research in their field, yet 64% admit to not making their data easily accessible. So what’s stopping them? Continue reading
Digital lab notebook
“The conventional paper lab notebook is dead – or at least it’s on life support. With the advent of open electronic notebooks, data and methods are no longer cloistered in books or tucked away on private hard drives. But this gives the user some tradeoffs to consider. Read more about it on Nature Careers”